The Adventures of Sally Read online

  At this frank revelation of the red-haired young man's personalopinions, Sally, though considerably startled, was not displeased. Abroad-minded girl, the outburst seemed to her a legitimate comment on amatter of public interest. The young man's companion, on the other hand,was unmixedly shocked.

  "My dear fellow!" he ejaculated.

  "Oh, it's all right," said the red-haired young man, unmoved. "She can'tunderstand. There isn't a bally soul in this dashed place that can speaka word of English. If I didn't happen to remember a few odd bits ofFrench, I should have starved by this time. That girl," he went on,returning to the subject most imperatively occupying his mind, "is anabsolute topper! I give you my solemn word I've never seen anybody totouch her. Look at those hands and feet. You don't get them outsideFrance. Of course, her mouth is a bit wide," he said reluctantly.

  Sally's immobility, added to the other's assurance concerning thelinguistic deficiencies of the inhabitants of Roville, seemed toreassure the dark man. He breathed again. At no period of his lifehad he ever behaved with anything but the most scrupulous correctnesshimself, but he had quailed at the idea of being associated evenremotely with incorrectness in another. It had been a black moment forhim when the red-haired young man had uttered those few kind words.

  "Still you ought to be careful," he said austerely.

  He looked at Sally, who was now dividing her attention between thepoodle and a raffish-looking mongrel, who had joined the party, andreturned to the topic of the mysterious Scrymgeour.

  "How is Scrymgeour's dyspepsia?"

  The red-haired young man seemed but faintly interested in thevicissitudes of Scrymgeour's interior.

  "Do you notice the way her hair sort of curls over her ears?" he said."Eh? Oh, pretty much the same, I think."

  "What hotel are you staying at?"

  "The Normandie."

  Sally, dipping into the box for another chocolate cream, gave animperceptible start. She, too, was staying at the Normandie. Shepresumed that her admirer was a recent arrival, for she had seen nothingof him at the hotel.

  "The Normandie?" The dark man looked puzzled. "I know Roville prettywell by report, but I've never heard of any Hotel Normandie. Where isit?"

  "It's a little shanty down near the station. Not much of a place. Still,it's cheap, and the cooking's all right."

  His companion's bewilderment increased.

  "What on earth is a man like Scrymgeour doing there?" he said. Sallywas conscious of an urgent desire to know more and more about the absentScrymgeour. Constant repetition of his name had made him seem almostlike an old friend. "If there's one thing he's fussy about..."

  "There are at least eleven thousand things he's fussy about,"interrupted the red-haired young man disapprovingly. "Jumpy oldblighter!"

  "If there's one thing he's particular about, it's the sort of hotelhe goes to. Ever since I've known him he has always wanted the best. Ishould have thought he would have gone to the Splendide." He mused onthis problem in a dissatisfied sort of way for a moment, then seemed toreconcile himself to the fact that a rich man's eccentricities must behumoured. "I'd like to see him again. Ask him if he will dine with me atthe Splendide to-night. Say eight sharp."

  Sally, occupied with her dogs, whose numbers had now been augmented bya white terrier with a black patch over its left eye, could not seethe young man's face: but his voice, when he replied, told her thatsomething was wrong. There was a false airiness in it.

  "Oh, Scrymgeour isn't in Roville."

  "No? Where is he?"

  "Paris, I believe."

  "What!" The dark man's voice sharpened. He sounded as though he werecross-examining a reluctant witness. "Then why aren't you there? Whatare you doing here? Did he give you a holiday?"

  "Yes, he did."

  "When do you rejoin him?"

  "I don't."

  "What!"

  The red-haired young man's manner was not unmistakably dogged.

  "Well, if you want to know," he said, "the old blighter fired me the daybefore yesterday."

  3